January 26, 2014

Sprouted Grain Pizza Valentines

Darwin and I are food shopping. He's buckled into the cart, and I hand him things to drop in: a pound of carrots, a bunch of rappini, a bag of dried beans, sprouted grain English muffins, and a few oranges. I give him a knot of ginger and he inhales the scent, deeply. Things are going pretty well.

Enter Bunny Cookies. They're small and chocolate or honey or some other sugar-attracted flavor and neither of us has ever eaten one, or seen someone else eat one, or gotten a look at one out of the box, but it doesn't matter. Darwin wants Bunny Cookies, and strains against the buckles to point. "I want to buy them!"

OK, I've got this. "Those cookies aren't very healthy for our bodies. I'll make us some bunny cookies at home." Then I let him pick out a special fruit instead. Thank you, universe, for my usually-not-tantrum-prone child.

Now, of course, Darwin often reminds me how I promised to summon a hopping army of healthy bunnies from our oven. The whole experience drives home how influential cool shapes are, whether we're serving broccoli trees or sweet potato stars or strawberry Santas or those bunny cookies I'll get around to eventually.

In the meantime, as I wait for bunny inspiration to strike (got any?), I'm making my little boy Valentine these sprouted grain English muffin pizzas, cut simply into hearts for the season...

Kids can spread and sprinkle the toppings themselves, and the mini pizzas have the hand-held appeal of the classic English muffin pizza...

Look for a marinara sauce that has five or fewer grams of sugar per serving, and extra virgin olive oil instead of soybean or canola oil. Choose whole milk mozzarella for healthy fats, and grate it at home for the best taste. Top with herbs and veggies like chopped basil, red onions, olives, mushrooms, and bell peppers.

4 comments:

yum, they look delicious! i've got my heart cookie cutters out for hemp burgers. as for the bunny cookies, i made a vegan sugar cookie a few years ago with rabbit cookie cutters. the kids loved them and you could use eggs if you wish.